


The Man I Long To Meet

by BlackjackKent



Category: Assassin's Creed
Genre: Assassin's Creed: Revelations, Constantinople, Gen, Internal Monologue, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-19
Updated: 2013-06-19
Packaged: 2017-12-15 11:24:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,450
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/848995
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlackjackKent/pseuds/BlackjackKent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Expectations vs. reality for Yusuf and Ezio.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Man I Long To Meet

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Burning_Nightingale](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Burning_Nightingale/gifts).



“Yusuf! Why the hurry?”

 Yusuf Tazim grinned at his lieutenant, swinging lightly around one of the pillars in the Galata den and lighting with a roll on the stone floor. “Can’t you follow a calendar, Dogan? The ship should be in today.”

“Master Auditore’s?” Dogan perked up cheerfully. “Finally...”

“ _Evet._ ” Yusuf was already at a jog towards the door. “See that our boys are looking presentable when we return. ”

* * *

 

_My dear Claudia,_

_My ship departs tomorrow. I have been given word of a man who is to meet me in Constantinopoli -- the leader of a cell of assassins based near the Golden Horn. I know little of him beyond that, and must trust in the honor and dedication of our order. It is not a hard trust to offer, and yet, traveling in strange lands I find myself more watchful, more alert. More careful. What happened to the boy you knew in Firenze, who never looked before he leapt?_

_I expect the man to be much like Maestro Machiavelli. A serious man with a serious purpose. I hope I will be viewed as a brother and not an interloper..._

* * *

 

Yusuf’s feet crunched on broken tiles as he raced along the rooftops of the bazaar. His arms and legs pumped heavily with the rapid speed and yet he ran with an easy gait, practiced and confident, for the movement, the running, was his life, and always had been. Even as a boy, before he knew the word ‘assassin’, he had known these roofs like old friends, known their secrets, learned their tricks and nooks and escape routes. 

He grinned to himself as he leapt from the eaves, the familiar jolt of his own weight surging up his wrist into the zipline. He had been waiting for this day a long time.

Word of the Borgia family’s fall in Roma had spread rapidly throughout the network of assassins across Europe, and had been greeted primarily with joy. For Yusuf’s own part, he had received the news with some fascination, and not a little glee. Who was this _Ezio Auditore_? What kind of man must he be, to be able to take down the center of Templar power in all of Europe?

And what must he, Yusuf, do to be like this man, in the service of his own fight against the growing threat in his homeland?

* * *

 

_The news I have been able to glean of the situation in Constantinopoli is muddled and difficult. I will require a guide, someone who knows the language and the people._

_I have pondered deeply, too, over the events at Masyaf. I still trust in my strength, but suspect that I will not be able to operate alone for much longer. Age does not cater easily to the business of killing._

_Should I not be able to properly impress myself upon our brothers in the east...I fear I may be lost._

* * *

 

Yusuf could see the pathway to the harbor as clear as if it were marked out for him; his eyes through ease of familiarity picked out landmarks, the gentle rise and fall of the rooftops, the easy climbs and the short jumps and the swinging lamps that would catch his hook like they were made for it. 

 _Lanet,_ but he loved this city. It was his own, his home, the place that made him as it remade itself every day through the ever-changing sea of faces from a thousand different lands. He wondered if the new mentor from İtalya would see it for the wonder it was, or merely as a means to an end, a pathway on his longer journey, a place to be through and done with as soon as possible.

 _No,_ Yusuf decided. He would _show_ this man everything he knew of the city. He would _make_ Ezio Auditore de...whatever...understand the importance of Istanbul, and perhaps in time the mentor might see Yusuf’s fight as his own.

Yusuf leapt from the eave of a rooftop with this thought in his mind -- and then his heart shot into his throat as he realized his leap had been short. He flailed, threw his arm forward...and his hookblade _just_ caught the lip of the next roof over, jolting him into the wall with a heavy thud. He groaned, clambered up over the edge, and sat sharply, catching his breath and letting the dizziness of adrenaline fade until he could think clearly.

What had happened? How had he lost his footing?

The answer was obvious, really, when he looked for it. He was letting himself get overexcited, and it had distracted him. Not only that, but he realized, as he sat there on the rooftop and examined his own thoughts, that he was a little afraid. Not that he feared danger from the _kardeşim_ who the brotherhood was sending to him, but he feared being under examination as leader of his men and found wanting. He had heard stories of _Efendi_ Machiavelli. And he worried that he was facing weeks with such a man -- determined, powerful, and humorless.

 _Well, if he is so...what of it?_ He shook himself, turned his eyes towards the water again. _He will be as he is, and I will not change for him._

But he wondered what the next hour was going to hold for him.

* * *

 

_I must close this letter and try to sleep, sister. I will write again when I reach Constantinopoli safely. Be safe, take care of yourself, and assist my brothers wherever you can. And now and then spare a kind thought for your true brother, who goes into the wilds of the east to play the great leader, if they will have him there._

_Tuo fratello (or kardeşinin as the Turks say),_

_Ezio_  

* * *

 

The ship sat at anchor in the harbor and Yusuf watched its occupants disembark. One of them he knew by sight at once. _Suleiman. Our mentor travels in illustrious company._ The young man was followed by a woman, and then...

_That must be him._

Auditore was tall, muscular, broad in the shoulders with a confident stride. He wore a battered grey cloak that looked like it might have once been white, fur-lined as if for a winter journey. He spoke quietly to Suleiman for a moment, then turned away, his eyes scanning the docks. Yusuf, even in his crouched hiding place at the top of a nearby building, could almost feel the Italian’s gaze on him. _This is a man who misses nothing._  

No point in waiting any longer. Trying to ignore his surge of nerves, Yusuf caught a nearby tree branch and swung from the rooftop, landing lightly on the stone road. As Auditore turned away from him, he strode forward and clapped the man sharply on the shoulder.

“ _Hoşgeldin, kardeşim!_ Unless the legend is a lie, you are the man I long to meet!” he cried. Overenthusiastic, perhaps, but the truth. Auditore turned towards him with a frown; Yusuf felt his stomach drop at the seriousness and suspicion in the dark eyes that rounded on him. But he pressed doggedly on; now that the moment had arrived, his mouth was leading a life of its own, all his irreverence surging to the forefront without being called for. “Renowned master and mentor...Ezio Auditore de...” _Allah kahretsin!_ He couldn’t remember the man’s full name. With a sigh, he waved his hand uncertainly. “De... la la la.”

Auditore looked baffled, and the lines in his face deepened. “Prego?”

Well, that was that. Yusuf’s tongue always got ahead of his mind and it hadn’t wasted any time in this instance. Inwardly he winced. _This is how you make a man impatient to be gone. You will be lucky if he stays an hour, let alone joins the Byzantine war._

But then, amazingly, Auditore’s eyes narrowed suddenly at the corners in an amused smile. The effect was astonishing. The years for a moment melted off him, and Yusuf could see a boyish laugh buried somewhere deep in his chest, a forgotten, innocent youth struggling beneath the years of responsibility and struggle. Indeed...he seemed to be grinning almost with relief at this casual welcome. 

And Yusuf grinned back, and felt his worries lift. “Forgive me,” he said with a laugh. “I have a hard time remembering all that Italian gibberish.”  

“ _Da Firenze_ ,” said Auditore with the mock-patience of a schoolmaster, raising a hand as if to accentuate his pronunciation. “The city where I was born.”

 _A pleasure to meet you, Efendi._ “Ah, yes.” Yusuf nodded slowly, his eyes sparkling. “So by your custom, I would be... _Yusuf Tazim da Istanbul._ I like that.”

Yes. Things were going to be all right.

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, there. :) Really hoping you enjoy this. Screed is, unfortunately, the one I'm least familiar with of the three fandoms I volunteered for, so I debated a lot about what to write about...but you said you like Yusuf, and so do I, and I liked the idea of him and Ezio wondering what the other would be like, since both are irreverents trapped in the bodies of 'serious men with serious purposes.'
> 
> Hope you like! :D


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